Intrepid
by JShale
Summary: When a secretive but routine mission goes catastrophically wrong, its singular survivor is tasked with picking up meaningless fragments in the aftermath. With nothing to recover and no one to save, he is left to make sense of the intangible and find a new purpose. Of Engineers, Humans, monsters and the gears of fate.
1. Prologue

_This story follows the events of Those Whom Fortune Favours through the Engineer's eyes. If you want to keep him somewhat of a mystery, probably don't read this._

* * *

 _"Yet though a man gets many wounds in breast,  
_ _He dieth not, unless the appointed time,  
_ _The limit of his life's span, coincide;  
_ _Nor does the man who by the hearth at home  
_ _Sits still, escape the doom that Fate decrees."_

― AESCHYLUS, Fragment

* * *

 _Wob. Wob. Wob._

The dull drone of the mighty starship's engines, deep enough that one _felt_ rather than _heard_ it, had developed the most subtly irritating warble beneath his boots as he meandered the Juggernaut's curved, dimly-lit hallways ad nauseum throughout the evening. It was hard to put out of his mind, its pervasive echoes through each deck and up the walls stalking him wherever he went, sticking to his soles like a shadow.

The others hadn't noticed, despite the fact that he'd mentioned it on several occasions where it was at its most annoying. It wasn't an issue, supposedly. Did no damage. Calm down.

Easy enough for _them_ to say – _they_ weren't the ones that knew these Juggernauts inside and out, down to the last relay; _they_ weren't the ones that became one with the machine, felt every subtle shift in its operation. After all, to the rest of the crew, it was but a vessel, a means to an end, a mode of transport.

He knew what caused it, too. There was little doubt it was simply a lack of complete, unquestionable control by the present helmsman. Reasonable, he supposed; Lieutenant Hendur was the ship's Operations Officer, after all. Not the Pilot. No amount of persistent nagging would bring him to focus on the most minute details of spaceflight while his own specialty was dragging him away. Nature of the beast, he supposed, in that the ship would fly the helmsman and not the other way around. Until then, the blasted oscillations would permeate every nook and cranny of the vessel at a pitch it seemed he and he alone would bear until driven mad.

Lieutenant Asakku, ever the ham-fisted Tactical Officer, was no better, mind. Not only was there a return to the mind-bending warble at faster-than-light velocity whenever he was in the seat, but crossing the barrier into hyperspace with him at the helm was about as subtle as marching headlong into the enormous, _brick shit-house_ of a soldier himself. The curves of the Juggernaut howled in protest whenever he threw it about its axes, and on more than one occasion the vibration throughout the vessel had grown so terrible that it had booted several bottles of rather expensive ĝeštin off their respective shelves in the crew Mess Hall and detonated them in a sticky, purple mess across the floor – though that had been one of the few times he'd seen the brute genuinely terrified of the Captain's ire. No amount of patient, simple training would convince him that Aldamarak's ears were for anything but decoration, or that his hands were anything other than blunt force instruments.

The Mess Hall, he knew, was one of the few places that was somewhat shielded from the constant, warbling drone.

It wasn't the sound itself that pissed him off, he reasoned as he rounded the corner leading to the broad archway separating the Mess Hall from the rest of the corridor. It was having to stand back and witness someone else doing a shoddy, reckless job of piloting his ship while he was off-duty.

His stomach growled in agreement.

Idly poking at the nearest food dispenser with a long, pale index finger, he released an irritated sigh and waited impatiently for the machine to go about its business. It was hardly _his_ ship though, was it? It was easy enough to ignore the niggling discontent shadowing his every move when the ship was fully staffed; nothing like fifty men and women rushing about the halls to make the place feel lived-in, and focusing on his own subordinates was often ample distraction from the ship's senior staff.

And _his_ underlings weren't _allowed_ to fly this poorly.

It had been a year that felt like three since being assigned to this vessel, but the Admiral's orders to reduce to minimum staff for this mission had left him no buffer between himself and the fact that he simply didn't mesh with this crew – he was finally forced to admit it.

Looks like today's special was _yet another_ bowl of mystery stew. Fantastic.

Seizing the tray from the dispenser, he pulled back one of the scooped, unforgiving chairs lingering about the central table and sank into it with a huff. Forty chairs, and only one was occupied. Seemed ludicrous.

He knew that being selected for these secretive, preeminent missions was a mark of pride amongst most seasoned Officers. There was little else that showed the Admiralty's respect and faith in a crew more undeniably than this, and there was no question that _this_ crew had certainly interpreted it that way. He, however, wasn't convinced.

Perhaps he was just missing the point, but something about these missions didn't sit well and no amount of pride, misplaced or otherwise, could disperse the barrage of thoughts, dark thoughts, that came with the package. The last had left him feeling numb for weeks, and being older and wiser for this one somehow didn't leave him feeling any more resistant.

Today's soup tasted just like yesterday's. Disappointment with far too much salt.

 _Wob. Wob. Wob._

Even in here, the poor engines throbbed at his feet through the deck. It was as though the ship was begging him to get on with it and start his shift so it could be put out of its misery; at this point, if he was physically able, he simply wouldn't leave the navigation array for the sake of a smooth, sane voyage. Sitting alone on the Bridge was vastly more stimulating than sitting alone in the Mess Hall, too. There was nothing interesting about the vast hoops arching through the roof and down the corridor – he had picked at every detail over the many hours he'd spent sitting here, until recently listening to the idle hubbub that came with Ensigns and recruits milling about the place.

Sometimes he found himself entertaining the idea that maybe, just maybe, he was slowly, painfully going crazy. This was one of those times.

"Hey, Za'il. Why the long face?"

He'd heard the footsteps, but the chaos in his mind had left him all but disregarding them. Cursing his inattention silently, he stiffened in his seat as the Captain strode through the archway and toward the head of the table with the slightest hint of a swagger about his military poise.

"Sir."

"Relax," the Captain offered with a wry grin, spinning a vacant chair around and sinking into it in one fluid movement. "I'm not one to get in the way of a man and his food."

Za'il's expression quickly matched the Captain's as he released a soft sigh, dropping the bread into what remained of the stew. "To be honest, it's stone cold at this point. Couldn't stomach it if I tried."

"And whose fault is that?"

"Well," he began, though he immediately trailed off with a soft huff. The throb of the tortured engines snatched his attention once more, echoing amongst the static of the silence that otherwise gripped the room and hung in it like molasses. That, or when he was actively seeking distraction – though at this point, anything would do: the rings of light playing against the broad, circular table from above; the persistent blinking of the lights above the food dispenser; the pattern of the hooped gunmetal arches leading from the crew Mess Hall; the stack of reports sitting on the bench closest to the door, begging to be filed.

"Spit it out, Commander," the Captain finally enthused with mock annoyance, propping one elbow against the table as he rested his chin on his fist. "What's bothering you?"

Za'il found himself pursing his lips as he fished for words, painfully aware of just how _many_ lectures he was flirting with if he were to word it even slightly poorly. He was as familiar with protocol as the next Officer, and he knew as well as the Captain that a diatribe about governance, the military's role in these blasted missions and his own place in all of it would be wasted breath.

Testing the Captain's patience was another way to step face-first into a lecture.

Gritting his teeth, he opted for the path of least resistance; agonise less, and prepare for a sermon.

"Honestly, this entire mission bothers me." As the Captain's dark eyes narrowed, he threw both hands up in immediate defense. "I know, I know. It's not my place to question orders from the Admiral – let alone the Senate. But it doesn't change the fact that these are hundreds of millions of lives being toyed with here. Sure, they can hardly be classified as _people_ , but it doesn't make it any easier to think about."

"Interesting choice of words," the Captain murmured, shifting to rest his lips against the thumbs of his clasped fists; tall, athletic, imposing, this was a man who imbued the very spirit of the Sebiti military. His stern, angular face was peppered with the scars one would expect of a man of his rank, though those scars would never mask the unnervingly common flashes of emotion from the suitably passionate Officer – much like the thinly-veiled frustration currently directed at Za'il. "Yes, it isn't for you or I to question our orders. Still, the difference between an Officer with intelligence and mere cannon fodder is the ability to _think_ , Admiralty's attitude toward independent thought be damned."

The Commander winced almost imperceptibly at the mention of _cannon fodder_.

"What do you know about this race?" The Captain asked after a breath, his eyes still trained on the somewhat smaller man before him.

"They're sadistic," the Commander murmured, monotone. "Arrogant, egotistical. They're violent and superstitious, addicted to power, motivated by conquest. I know. I've read the scraps they call a general report. It's the same as every other Anuka atrocity we've had to clean up in the past few centuries; violent caveman races hellbent on self-destruction and determined to take everyone else with them on the way out."

"How many of these missions have you been on, Commander?"

"One. Three years ago." He sighed, pushing aside the half-eaten bowl of stew. The mere thought of _that_ mission left him in even less of a mood to be dealing with food. "Early Anuka experiment. Had developed genocidal interest in their galactic neighbours, and had figured out how to reach them. Went Code Black real fast."

"The Edimmu?"

A chill ran down his spine. The soggy bread and cold soup suddenly seemed interesting. "That's the one."

"Ugly mission, that one," the Captain grunted, albeit in good humour. "Heard about it through my Captain at the time. Didn't realise you were on it."

"Indeed." Za'il sighed heavily, idly thumbing at the tray. "They knew we were coming. They _knew_ we were coming for them, and that they were doomed. They threw everything they had at us – weapons, ships, soldiers. In the end they were trying to set collision courses with our ships, but given they'd only been in space a century or so, it was like swatting flies. They were no match for us. Millions of years – it makes a difference."

A pause. The Captain's eyes pried at the Commander's stony features. "Which ship?"

"Pilot of the lead ship." The mental cacophony had frozen, though briefly – a rare moment where only one thought lingered, but of _course_ it had to be upon the Edimmu. "We were tasked with plucking their defenses off one-by-one. The other two ships dropped the warheads as we cleared a path. Fuckers hadn't a hope."

"Admiral chose well, didn't he? Thought protocol specified against reusing officers from the Code Black missions." Standing with a soft sigh, the Captain pushed himself to his feet and began grazing by the shelves in search of a drop. Anything to soften the conversation. "Well, Commander, you'll be _pleased_ to know this interdiction is of a different kind."

"I know," he murmured. "Same attitude, different meatbags. No interstellar capabilities. In fact, throwing rocks is about all they've managed. They just throw them very, very well."

"Rocks, spears, arrows," the Captain offered a wry grin as he popped the lid off a half-empty bottle with one hand, snagging a glass with another. "Nothing that warrants more than a single ship with minimal crew. And they won't have the foggiest what's hit them. Quite merciful in comparison. Far more than they deserve."

Za'il couldn't help but scowl as his thoughts refused to leave the constant barrage of small, primitive vessels on suicide missions, flinging themselves with all their desperate might at the trio of enormous Sebiti battleships. He could clearly recall the two that had managed to batter themselves against his hull, blowing themselves to smithereens before they could be picked off with weapons, but leaving little more than blackened smut-marks against the Juggernaut. The rest had been mere fireworks. Manned, frantic fireworks, staving off certain doom. "I hope you're right."

Setting himself back down with a huff, the Captain took a short swig of the ruby-red concoction in his glass as he leaned back in the chair. "Za'il, I know the Edimmu interdiction was almost a worst-case scenario. It's a challenge to come back from that. I understand your reservations, I really do – but this isn't the same thing."

 _Edimmu massacre,_ he thought to himself quietly as he forced himself to hold eye contact.

The Captain continued. "The Senate does not interdict failed planets on a whim. This is a planet we've had contact with for _tens of thousands_ of years; unlike the Edimmu, the Anuka seemed to have invested an awful lot of time and patience into this species before us, and according to what little documentation is available, had quite insistently handed the baton to us. For millennia, we complied. Sent hundreds of envoys. Offered guidance, knowledge. Soon as our backs are turned, suddenly they're worshipping us, demonising us, writing mythology about us. Fighting wars in our name. Then they carry that mythos onward in their own image, and repeatedly we would intervene – our envoys would start the process again. Teach, guide, engage. Rinse and repeat. Which is all very well and good, but then they started...evolving."

Za'il raised a brow. "Evolving, Sir?"

He took another sip, then placed the glass down, cupping it between both hands. "They're undergoing rapid technological development. Apparently the last of the envoys said it's unlike anything they've ever seen; there's intensification everywhere. Architecture, medicine, agriculture. Weapons. War. None of which we passed on to them. And yet, their mindset stays the same. Still worshipping, still killing in the name of their deities, still forging empires in blood – but now we're seeing regular examples of wholesale slaughter. Not to put too fine a point on it, but they're _not very nice._ "

"I see," he breathed. "Still. If they're still throwing technologically advanced rocks at each other, why not persist with the envoys? It's not like they're even close to interstellar travel yet."

"Yet." Pursing his lips in thought, the Captain prodded at the rim of his glass with a thumb. "See, that's the problem. They said they're evolving...rapidly. I believe the term the Senate used in the full report was 'unprecedented'. They ran several different simulations _multiple times_ to be sure they hadn't fucked the numbers, because there's _no way_ anyone can imagine that a race at this stage of development could hit hyperspace in less than three millennia."

The Commander froze, fumbling with his words. "Wh–…"

"Yeah." The Captain's wide-eyed gaze seemed as surprised by the news second-hand as it must have been the first time. "Smart monkeys. Smart, scary monkeys. Disregarding the fact that several of their little empires have executed quite a number of our envoys in recent times, they seem somewhat harmless now. But give them enough time, they're going to keep blowing things up until they reach orbit. Next thing you know, our great-grandchildren are going to have _guests_ showing up, kicking down the door with weapons that rival our own, declare us gods and demons, and demand anything their unevolved, superstitious minds can conjure up. Can you imagine it – all the technology required to cause trouble, but all they want is magical abilities. Invincibility. Eternal life. Superpowers. And with their millennia of wars behind them, they'll take what they please."

"Pleasant," Za'il grumbled, though he found little else followed.

"You can't take the hunt out of the hunter," the Captain mused grimly, before drawing a long, hearty gulp from his glass. "And, so the Senate says, we can't afford to keep throwing envoys at them in the hopes one of them will finally be listened to. The Edimmu were an Anuka creation, and they were left to their own devices. The creatures of the Utukka system were...tinkered with, from what I understand. At least, that's what I gather from the report, in all its vague glory. Suffice it to say, they're _not_ what they were intended to be, and it's a matter of compassion that we extinguish the fire before it sets everything nearby ablaze. It's not just _us_ they present a danger to; there are several other Anuka creations in the region and one example of independent sentient life, all of which are evolving far more slowly than the Utukka race, and would be defenseless once their thirst for conquest reaches the stars."

The Commander found himself mulling the term _compassion_ for longer than he'd like. Perhaps it was his own overactive mind toying with it far more than he was supposed to, but the word seemed to have so many meanings, so many use-cases, and when looked at objectively, they were wildly different to each other. Offering the shirt off your back to a homeless man, and decimating an entire planet's worth of murderous, inferior lifeforms for the sake of their neighbours hardly seemed equivalent.

Semantics aside, the facts remained: they were eliminating a failed experiment for the safety of those less able to defend themselves. He shuddered to think what this species could be capable of should they start colonising nearby planets and cementing their power in the region. The Sebiti Military, and indeed the Empire as a whole, was more than capable of defending itself against fleet after fleet of rogue, primitive spacefarers; there was little trouble from far, far more advanced races, so why be concerned over fresh faces with no concept of space warfare?

But it wasn't the Sebiti Empire that needed protection.

Perhaps, if one squinted hard enough, it was as they said – they were exterminating hornet's nests for the sake of the neighbours.

"The needs of the many, huh," he eventually murmured quietly.

"Indeed." Standing for a refill, the Captain cast his officer a lingering stare; the Commander had done a _splendid_ job of hiding his discomfort, and discomfort was hardly useful in an Officer. "You know, once this mission is over, it may be worth taking some time off. I need you at peak efficiency; can't get that out of you with so much going on in that head of yours."

He let out a low huff after a moment. "To be honest, that's not a bad idea. I've got some shit to sort out, haven't I?"

"Maybe a little," the Captain grinned. "In the meantime, I want you to _try_ and focus on the operation at hand. I'm authorising you a copy of the full mission report – I reckon there's some material in there that will put your mind at ease."

Za'il arched a brow. As far as he knew, such material was the preserve of hand-selected Captains and higher. "Sir?"

"Captain's prerogative. I can share what I wish with my First Officer."

Finally, a smile. Nothing like a little leeway to begin forging trust, if a little belatedly. "Understood, Sir. Thank you."

* * *

"Do you mind?"

The impatient, vaguely nasal voice echoing down the corridor from the Bridge was Lieutenant Hendur's, he noted. Above the _clomp-clomp_ of his own footsteps against the metallic deck, he could hear someone else's footsteps, the repeated _beep_ of buttons, and the telltale _squeak_ of the Captain's chair swivelling back and forth.

The gruff, bassy chortling that followed was, without a doubt, Lieutenant Asakku.

"Some of us are trying to work."

More chortling followed as Hendur's patience wore thinner.

As much as it could be entertaining riling the slight, jumpy Officer, the persistent _wob-wob-wob_ from the complaining engines was on the brink of driving him insane, and Asakku deliberately getting under Hendur's skin was simply amplifying the problem.

Stepping onto the Bridge presented the Commander with exactly the scenario he was expecting to see; Hendur was manning the navigation array, likely fuming beneath his helmet as Asakku continued poking buttons from the Captain's chair. Granted, at first glance it appeared he was genuinely doing work. The dry, scratching _screech_ as he leaned to the side to pivot the chair off-balance suggested he intended to do it loudly.

He stood just outside of the range of both men's line of sight, silently watching with his hands clasped behind his back as they went about their business; Hendur, by now, was stabbing furiously at his console with one hand as he manned the flight controls with the other, caught up in Operations schematics as they flooded in. Asakku had no interest in pulling them up on his own console, clearly – his was saturated with the results of repeated scans of the multiple weapons systems on board, each slightly different as he tinkered a bit here, calibrated a bit there. Noisily.

A deep, infinitely frustrated growl permeated the room from beneath the helmet. "Lieutenant, seriously, can you do that another time?"

 _Wob. Wob._

 _Enough is enough._ Clearing his throat loudly, Za'il stepped into view from behind the archways as both Officers visibly flinched to attention at their stations. "Professional as always, I see."

A gruff _Sir_ followed from both stations.

"Lieutenant Hendur, you're relieved. Shift's over. Lieutenant Asakku, do you _need_ to be here right now?"

"Running diagnostics," the immense soldier grumbled, half-turning his chair from the Commander as his right hand gagged to return to its work. Za'il once again found himself thanking the rigidity of rank in light of the oversized creature's irritating mood; Asakku easily had a head in height over him and was substantially bulkier, with a face full of harsh angles and heavy, sinewy scaffolding. He was the sort of brute that became useful for intimidating enemies – which he did with great delight and frightening prowess – but he was nothing short of _wildly aggravating_ when kept on a leash. It was as though he existed exclusively for the thrill of the fight, and in lieu of enemies to wreak it upon, colleagues seemed to suffice.

"You can run diagnostics again later," he responded with terse, deliberate authority as he motioned with one hand toward the door. "We've only got another day before we reach Syurga Outpost. Last time I checked, the cargo bay was still a pigsty. Go sort it out."

"I'm not a housemaid," the enormous Lieutenant exclaimed with barely-contained outrage, then aimed a pointed finger at the lithe figure climbing down from the navigation array. "Ilabrat's free! You just dismissed him! Make _him_ do it!"

"Lieutenant," the Commander boomed, "Hendur is _off duty_. That cargo bay is for _your warheads_. You have your orders. Get off my Bridge!"

Za'il waited for the offbeat pacing of two heavy pairs of boots to all but disappear down the hall before releasing a long, heavy sigh and releasing both clenched fists. There was nothing like ill-tempered, insubordinate juniors to stoke the fires of the infamous Sebiti rage, and the embers had been sizzling in the pit of his stomach for days.

If he were younger, less experienced, perhaps he would have yielded to the clawing, burning sensation in his gut, churning against the rationality and calm of wisdom. The temptation was certainly there. But it was that wisdom, the decorum of the seasoned, that remained determined to keep his teeth in his mouth and Asakku's notably more tempestuous rage off his Bridge.

It took mere seconds to find the source of the instability in the engines; the helmet had barely descended over his head before he'd begun poking about with the controls. A visceral sigh of relief escaped him as the infuriating, endless warble melted into a soft purr, no longer pecking at his psyche as he set the full gamut of his concentration on the glittering display painted in white and cyan throughout the helmet's visor.

For now, for the rest of the day, all would be right in the Galaxy.

* * *

He had to admit, though a twelve-hour shift was unusually long, it tended to fly by in the blink of an eye when he had the Bridge to himself and minimal interruptions. It went without saying that the Pilot's seat was the place he was the happiest, and without the Captain eyeballing his every move or either of the two Lieutenants getting under foot, the Juggernaut sailing smoothly beneath his hand was a rare sliver of paradise.

Still, he was very much ready for rest by the time he'd staggered out of the navigation array and handed control back to the Captain after he'd discreetly passed Za'il a copy of the full mission briefing. Hendur had briefly cornered him enroute to his quarters, rambling breathlessly about some odd development in a nebula they'd passed a day ago after thanking him for booting Asakku from the Bridge. It had taken longer than he'd liked before the Lieutenant noticed the dark rings under his eyes and the slouch in his stance, and seemed reluctant to let the yawning Commander leave and get some rest, but had eventually taken the hint and let him shuffle on.

The Captain's suggestion of taking leave had stayed with him since it had arisen. It had been years, he realised, after a quick scour through his recent memories; it had been back-to-back duty for the entire year he'd been assigned to this ship, with the exception of a few brief spurts of shore leave. He'd deliberately kept himself busy after the Edimmu mission – _massacre_ – and that had been three years ago. Apart from a short two weeks spent sucking his thumb in the bowels of the distant Starbase Isimud after Nanaya had chewed him up and spat him out, the four years before _that_ had been largely back-to-back too, spread across multiple ships as he scaled the ranks and found himself assigned to increasingly prominent vessels.

It had been non-stop since Mami, too. And Makai.

Come to think of it, he hadn't stepped foot on his own goddamn home planet since he left it as a fresh-faced, green-as-Hell recruit at a mere eighteen years old.

He released a frustrated sigh as he tossed the report against the bedcovers, crossing his small, cramped quarters in a short few steps to the basin before hunching over it and reflexively dousing his face in a cupped handful of cold water. Entirely unnecessary in this day and age, of course, but there was refreshment in the cold shock that simply couldn't be replicated with sonic showers. There was little aboard these ships to remind one that they were a living, breathing creature. With as much of his adult life that he'd spent being shuffled from one to the next, it was these small, meaningless rituals that kept him sane.

Or at least, that's what he told himself.

He'd spent _years_ in these suits, too. The military had honed the concept of a uniform to a fine art, the height of which doubled as a pressure suit and a biosuit, and could interface with stasis pods at a moment's notice. They monitored and took care of a vast number of biological functions, too – in fact, they had almost rendered the sonic showers themselves, amongst other bathroom utilities, obsolete – and, as he'd discovered on a handful of occasions, offered a Hell of a lot more armoured protection to the wearer than all of the previous iterations he'd worn put together.

As a younger man he'd yielded to the desire to rip it off each night and sleep as nature intended, snuggling into the bedcovers and feeling the fabric against his skin. It had meant waking up earlier before each shift to scrub up and climb back into it, but it was, to him, a luxury of home that stayed with him until several incidents left him scrambling out of bed naked as the day he was born and desperately trying to dress while the ship, under fire, bucked and shuddered and refused to let him stand on his feet.

Nowadays he was content to remain ready at all times, not even bothering to pull back the top sheet as he swiped the report and threw himself down. It wasn't like he was missing out on much in the process, anyway.

Perhaps it was time to spend a few months back home on Senbi and do things that _normal people_ take for granted. It had, after all, been _years_ since he'd been to the public baths. It had been _years_ since he'd seen his mother. Heck, it had been _bloody years_ since he'd felt sunlight on his skin for more than a brief jaunt, and on more than just his face and hands. After all these years, surely he deserved the privilege of standing in an _actual_ shower each day for a while, and sitting down to _actual_ food – a hearty change from the synthesised gunk the dispensers burped up aboard these ships.

Yes, after this confounded mission was over, it was time for a proper leave of absence and a good, hard _think_ about where he was headed exactly. Right now, his answer would simply be 'around in circles'.

The report made for pretty grim reading, he soon realised as he thumbed over the thin, clear tablet, grazing over the never-ending scrawl of bureaucratic ramblings spewed across it. Utukka was, apparently, one of the most vibrantly diverse natural planets the Anuka had come across before their interference, festooned with a rich history of rapid evolution and life lurking at almost every single biome. By the time the Anuka had discovered it, there was already semi-sapient life ambling its surface. They had simply chosen the most promising amongst the plethora of species hidden in every nook and cranny, and given it a little kick in the right direction.

Naturally, the result was a species that looked _somewhat_ like the Anuka, and by extension his own people, but far more recognisably different than the experimental species spread across the galaxy.

Unfortunately, the Captain had been right about one small detail – the species had been prolific and inventive hunters prior to Anuka interference, and it had served their evolution well. Even with their new, rapid evolution toward true sapience, that instinct had struggled to die off.

Their mindsets had also failed to evolve with their technological leaps and bounds, too. That much was obvious as the report went further and further into detail of their atrocious behaviours.

Perhaps this was the right thing to be doing, after all.

Thumbing through, he noted a different code alongside the recommended warheads; while the Edimmu had been sentenced to run-of-the-mill blasts and follow-up supposed 'cleaner bombs' that disassembled all organic life down to and beyond its genetic structure, leaving the planet completely decolonised and ready for subsequent recolonisation, Utukka seemed earmarked for something a little more precise. These, he recognised as the 'scraper' warheads, primed for a specific genome that he imagined was that of the species causing all this angst amongst the Senate. He'd never seen them in action, but he understood they carefully plucked apart whatever they were primed for, leaving all other life largely intact and able to reclaim whatever world they inhabited.

That was supposed to make him feel better about this whole ordeal, he supposed; it was more _compassionate_ , apparently. Perhaps the Senate valued naturally-spawned life, then.

It was the final note at the very base of the report that left him somewhat sure he'd actually sleep at all tonight. It would be the first night in many, he had to confess, that he wouldn't thrash about, thinking and thinking and _thinking_ about the Edimmu mission that plagued his memories, wondering how differently things would have played out should the Senate have ordered different actions.

 _Utukka species has shown an unusual propensity toward violence for gaining power, amassing possessions for status and enforcing social tiers that do not serve the majority. Some colonies have proven responsive to Sebiti envoys, welcoming them into their communities and absorbing some of their teachings. The larger empires have resisted, with some engaging in dialogue for their own eventual gain while others resort to more violent means. Three of the last four envoys were murdered by two prominent empires, with the surviving envoy recommending ceasing all contact after repeated attempts at engaging in peaceful strategies. Two clandestine operations arrived at the same conclusion after lengthy studies. Utukka species is dangerous and will soon become a threat to nearby peaceful species._

These, he decided, were creatures he never wanted to meet. There was something uncomfortable, something sordid, about a species that had the nouse for rapid technological advances but no interest in or intelligence for peaceful coexistence with others like them. He imagined their mere presence would be revolting – his military mind could not understand those of the ever-diplomatic envoys, but he couldn't help but feel their frustrations in this instance.

As he closed his eyes, the dimming lights gave way not to the scorch of fiery explosions and the flare of energy weapons, but to the echoing _tramp-tramp_ of alien feet along the streets of Senbi's capital city, rifles drawn and demands declared as they gunned down innocent citizens of a peaceful world in their bottomless thirst for conquest.

* * *

"SJX-591, Syurga Station. You have clearance to land – dock at Hangar A-14."

"Understood," the Captain nodded from his chair, shoulders squared before the holographic woman etched in a halo of white-and-cyan pearls of light. Her uniformed figure, ramrod-straight and preternaturally imposing, soaked up far more of the Bridge than she displaced; the beads of light that etched every inch of her barely missed a single crease amongst her stony features. She was, in every sense of the word, authoritative. "Admiral Nusku, one request, if I may."

"Yes, Captain Shamar?" The brief jolt throughout the vessel momentarily displaced the hologram, blurring it in a haze of motion as the dots of light sought to rearrange themselves.

"Permission to reroute past the storm to the south of the base. The designated approach will put us directly through the eye." He offered his First Officer a quick glance, but Za'il's attention was entirely focused on keeping the ship steady, his hands a flurry of movement upon the controls.

A pause. "Permission granted, but make it quick."

"Yes Sir." Another bow of his head, and the hologram dissipated with a faint _bzz_.

Another jolt surged through the deck, followed by a bassy, droning throb throughout the vessel as it resisted the storm. Lieutenants Hendur and Asakku had visibly tensed by their stations, each gripping the nearest surface they could find as the shock oscillated through the deck and rolled straight into the next bout of turbulence. The Captain, poised in his chair in as much a relaxed slouch as he could muster, gave himself away only by the ripples of sinew pulsating through his cheeks as he repeatedly clenched his jaw.

Beneath his helmet, Za'il was grinning. _Grinning._ He could _sense_ the discomfort on the Bridge, knowing there were multiple hands groping at whatever solid fixture was within reach. The deathly silence in the wake of the Admiral's message was rather telling. But when presented with landing a starship, its crescent-like curves designed for the vacuum of space and woefully inadequate for atmospheric flight, let alone battling a massive, surging storm on a gravity-ravaged moon, he didn't feel an inch of the trepidation soaked into the skin of his fellow Officers. No; he had flown in far more hazardous conditions. This was a _challenge_.

"Diverting East via the Ninegal Range. Reducing altitude to six thousand metres for approach." The whirl of his hands was at odds with the practised calm of his voice, and defied the persistent jostling throughout the vessel as it continued to penetrate the monstrosity outside.

The Captain scowled as he jabbed at his leftmost console, scrutinising the reading it immediately burped up. "Commander, I asked for a diversion to reduce how much _crap_ gets smashed against the decks, not just to dodge the storm."

"Admiral said to make it quick," he immediately shot back, frustratingly calm.

A deep, rumbling sigh escaped the Captain. "If Ilabrat pukes everywhere, I'm holding you responsible, Commander."

Lieutenant Hendur's already pale complexion faded to something distinctly ghostly at the mere suggestion.

Stony, thick silence filled the Bridge as the ship journeyed onward, trading sharp troughs of turbulent shaking and jolting that its artificial gravity fought valiantly against as they exited the storm for the telltale flutter and bounce of surging, swirling mountainous conditions. He knew how disconcerting it must be for his three crewmates, bracing against the atmospheric undulations blindly, forced to place their trust in his piloting. For that, he almost took pleasure in being the only one with a view outside, their fates at his fingertips. They didn't know these ships like he did, and they most certainly hadn't shown signs of understanding how to _force_ planetary physics to comply with their interstellar design.

The storm, thankfully, had yet to reach the base; exiting the confines of the Ninegal Range brought with it a relieving stillness, leaving little bar the thundering of the engines as they eased the mighty Juggernaut toward the yawning hangar to its southeastern edge. Calm conditions were a blessing, making their final descent into the gaping maw mere child's play to experienced hands; there would be no need of tractor beams or automated guidance systems often doled out to the supply and occasional civilian ships that passed through.

"Commencing docking procedure, Captain," Za'il announced as the ship sank toward the hangar door.

"Noted." A pause as he stabbed at his console with an index finger. "Syurga crew standing by."

Going about his tasks almost by rote, routine etched into his fingertips to the point of being mere reflex, the Commander found ample opportunity to glance about the Bridge from beneath his helmet to observe his three crewmates. Captain Shamar, he knew, was a man not unlike himself; steely resolve and a mind for the task at hand, his career too had been forged in fire the old-fashioned way and yielded similar outcomes – it seemed the biggest point of difference lay with the Captain's fixation on discrete sections of time, methodically dividing missions into their individual tasks and navigating them with the mastery of experience rather than Za'il's preference for examining the lot from a steady distance. It was not Shamar's discomfort that had led to the diversion request – he knew for a fact the Captain would have _happily_ ploughed straight through the storm if it were just the two of them on board an empty vessel. No, it was purely common sense as far as decisions went.

Lieutenant Hendur, conversely, had gone a sickly shade of grey as he stood stiffly by his post. There was an almost imperceptible wobble in his stance as he rocked back and forth in the aftermath of the turbulence, dark eyes trained upon a fixed point immediately in front of him. Despite the fact that there were only a few years between them, it struck him that they were not cut from the same cloth; it was frustratingly easy to ruffle the Lieutenant's composure, and despite repeated exposure to more adventurous flying techniques, a slew of skirmishes and plenty of training, his resolve had shown minimal improvement in lieu of a persistent, nagging obsession with the most mundane of interstellar phenomena.

Which, to be fair, was largely the point of an Operations Officer.

It was Asakku's response that had caught his attention the most, though. While both he and the Captain had expected yet another woozy response from the notably delicate Lieutenant Hendur, the larger Lieutenant's similarly grey, clammy complexion was a far more unusual sight. Lips pressed thin, his steely stance by his post seemed as though like he was clinging for dear life but was loathe to admit it.

How strange it was to be a part of a crew with whom one had nothing in common.

The final _bump_ of the immense vessel coming to rest against the base of the hangar was mere static at his periphery as he began powering the propulsion systems down, but as the Captain set about interfacing with the base, a loud, wet retch echoed through the Bridge. As a second, somewhat more violent retch followed, he paused in his tasks to find not Hendur but Asakku bent over, closed fist pressed against his lips, desperately fighting the wall of bile filling his throat. Idly he wondered if it would trigger a chain reaction, or whether it would result in a day or two of ridicule for the otherwise composed Officer.

"Docking complete, station airbridge and airlock in place." The Captain released an amused sigh as he turned in his chair to face the massive Lieutenant. "Asakku, you'll join us in the cargo bay once you've pulled yourself together."

Narrowing his eyes through a damp glare, the Lieutenant turned on a heel and, hunched over his stomach as a third, convulsive gag wracked him from head to toe, swiftly marched off the Bridge and down the hall.

"You too Ilabrat, or are you still functional?"

"I'm fine, Captain," he offered after expelling a deep, shaky breath, his voice thin and unsure.

"Excellent," the Captain responded as he pushed himself out of his chair. "Then you have the Bridge; commence planetside operations. Commander, you're with me."

* * *

"Question, if I may, Sir."

The Captain arched a thick brow as the pair marched the length of the darkened, abandoned corridors leading to the cargo bay. "Sure."

"Since it wasn't Hendur that lost his guts, am I off the hook?" Za'il asked, deadpan.

Shamar simply marched on in silence for a breath, jaw slack as the cogs turned. "I knew it. You did this on purpose."

The Commander's expression swiftly mimicked the Captain's prior surprise. "I beg your pardon, Sir?"

A wry grin eventually crept across the Captain's scarred face. "You enjoy toying with those two, don't you?"

He couldn't hide his amusement for long. "It's not like it's hard. The moment we're in orbit of _anything_ they go grey." Releasing a sigh, he shook his head. "They're just not made of the same stuff."

"Of course they aren't." The Captain's grin soured somewhat as they rounded a corner, the corridor widening as it approached the vast hoop of the cargo bay door. "You know neither of them have actually set foot on a planet for ten years prior to today?"

A thoughtful pause. "I'd be surprised if I wasn't just about in the same shoes. I think I've had maybe a month of _actual_ shore leave in the last thirteen years. Maybe less. Most of it ends up being on board whatever Starbase is closest. Lucky to be in orbit of anything. Surely you're no different."

"You _do_ have the advantage of atmospheric missions, though. As do I." Drawing a breath, the Captain pressed his fingers against the door lock. "Keeps you grounded. It's different, being in space year upon year. It changes you."

"So I've heard." The Commander fell in behind the Captain's broad march as they crossed the empty expanse of the cargo bay. "Enough that planetsiders can tell after many years, they reckon."

"They," the Captain chuckled. "Who are 'they', specifically?"

Another pause before the exterior doors. "Always straight to the point, Sir." He offered a lopsided grin. "You know, since we're here for a day or two, maybe this would be a good opportunity to let the kids off their leash and get some _real_ air into them."

Shamar seemed to entertain the idea for a lingering moment. "Maybe."

As the mighty doors hissed apart and retracted into their alcoves, they were met with the unmistakable silhouette of a large, fully-loaded artillery trolley blocking the majority of the tunnel's overhead lighting; a stony-faced Lieutenant stepped toward the door from beside it, a thin, clear tablet pinched between both hands.

"Your full name and rank please, Sir," he offered in a detached monotone, offering the tablet to the Captain.

Pressing his hand against the glossy surface, he paid it no mind as a flash of light within traced every edge, every minute detail of his palm and fingers. "Captain Enmesar Shamar of the Juggernaut SJX-591."

The tablet, as the Lieutenant withdrew and examined it, was inclined to agree. "Thank you, Sir. We have a consignment for you."

Shamar offered a cheeky smirk. "You're all smiles and personality aboard this station, aren't you? Must be all that carbon dioxide outside."

With that, the Lieutenant's expression crumpled into something notably more panicked. "We have company, Sir," he quickly whispered.

"Are you bullying my staff, Shamar?" Icier than expected, and with a depth that came with age and wisdom, the Admiral's voice was velvet-smooth but not without a hint of danger; stepping around the towering trolley, she stood before the Juggernaut crew with predatory calm.

Both stiffened, immediately standing to attention. The Captain quickly responded. "Admiral, Sir."

Black eyes plucking apart each and every detail of the two Officers, she allowed the silence to draw out to almost unbearable lengths before offering the faintest hint of a smirk. "At ease, gentlemen. Welcome to Syurga Station."

"Thank you, Sir." A pause, as Shamar paused to look the trolley up and down again. Three more station crewmen had arrived to watch the exchange, earning a quick glance from the Captain. "Are we handloading today?"

"Until further notice, yes," the Admiral responded coolly. "We had a near-miss last week with the automated lifts. Suboptimal, really." She offered another almost-grin; Za'il quickly noted her eyes remained starkly humourless.

"Sounds wise."

"Indeed. Better safe than sorry, in my mind." Turning on a heel, the Admiral clasped her wrists behind her back. "Captain, will you accompany me?"

One brow raised, he regarded the statuesque woman for a lingering moment before briefly turning to his First Officer. "Commander, you'll take good care of my ship until I return, yes?"

"Of course, Sir."

With little more than a nod, Za'il watched as the Captain fell in behind the Admiral and marched down the airbridge alongside several more artillery trolleys. Behind him came the telltale grunt of Asakku begrudgingly joining them, likely as unimpressed as the Commander himself was upon seeing thousands of warheads waiting to be loaded, _by hand_ , into their housings onboard.

* * *

By the time the _ten bloody trolleys_ of warheads had been offloaded and slotted into place, filling the immense cargo bay from floor to ceiling, wall to wall, the Juggernaut's skeleton crew were more than ready to call it a day.

To his credit, Asakku had remained surprisingly on-task for the evening and had proven particularly helpful, keeping the pace quick without risking clumsiness and had been almost _obsessive_ about each warhead being loaded in the correct order. He'd outclassed the Syurga crew in every way that mattered, and though it had been the most menial of tasks, through the drudgery he had earned a fair bit of respect back in Za'il's mind.

By this hour all three of them had since retired to the Mess Hall, each making short work of _yet another_ bowl of stew and washing it down with whatever came to hand. Mind adrift as his fingers idly tore small, fiddly chunks from his bread, Za'il found himself once again entertaining the idea of preferring a busy Mess Hall packed with low-ranking staff than the present company. Be damned their exuberance, it made for excellent people-watching. Their conversation meandered between the inane and the insane, and it was all too easy to simply get lost in the noise. With only these two for company, the conversation had little direction it _could_ go in.

Predictably, tonight it had gone around in stilted circles as both Asakku and Hendur apparently toyed with the concept of deliberately pissing each other off, but with neither committing to the idea. Perhaps they were too exhausted to be bothered. Perhaps they were finally learning to at least _tolerate_ each other. Only time would tell, really.

"Commander. Commander Suen."

It dawned on him that it hadn't been Hendur's first attempt at catching his attention. Despite himself, the half-dead _huh_ that escaped him hardly sounded intelligent.

Ilabrat released an irritated huff, and apparently repeated himself. "Do you think we'll get to go on base, or are we going to stay cooped up in here _again_?"

He couldn't help but chuckle under his breath. "Actually, I'd asked the Captain the same thing before we ended up with ten fucking trolleys to unload. I think we _need_ to, for the sake of our collective sanity, but I don't like our chances."

Another sigh escaped the smaller of the two Lieutenants, while Asakku indulged an unimpressed grunt as he waved his drink in Ilabrat's direction. "See. What did I tell you?"

"It was worth a try," Hendur scowled.

"Not an _awful_ lot of value is lost if we're left aboard, as much as I'd like to get us out there," Za'il interjected quietly. "From what I understand, the air on Syurga isn't great. The carbon dioxide levels are pretty high. Not enough to do damage, but enough to leave you feeling a little lethargic after a few days. Which, to be honest, is the exact opposite of the point, isn't it?"

"True," Hendur responded, one brow raised. Pausing for another mouthful of what remained of his stew, he gesticulated with the bread in his free hand. "What about just going on base, though? I mean, don't most stations have a promenade, or a bar, or _something_ just a bit different?"

"This isn't really a normal station," the Commander replied carefully, "So I doubt it. We're not here long, anyway."

"Uh huh. What about a rec lounge? Something? Anything?"

Asakku rolled his eyes as he shovelled the last of his dinner down and pushed the bowl aside. "What's the big deal, anyway?"

Another sigh. "We've been cooped up for _months_! It'd be nice to see some different faces for once. No offense Aldamarak, but you're pretty ugly."

For a brief moment, visceral offense gripped the huge man's features – though amused realisation quickly followed. "Different faces, huh."

By this point, Za'il found himself struggling to keep a straight face. "Itchy feet, Ilabrat? Or are we talking further North?"

"You know what, sure," he spluttered, his cheeks taking on a grey flush. "It'd be nice to see a few ladies outside this sausage-fest. Isn't that what shore leave is all about?"

A loud scoff followed, Asakku rolling his eyes again. Hendur raised one brow once more, though with considerably more malice than the Commander had seen in some time. "What, you _prefer_ the sausage-fest?"

"No," Asakku spat with obvious irritation, "I don't prefer _anything_. I'm here for business, not pleasure. How old are you, eighteen?"

"Wasn't aware there was an age to give up and tape it to your leg," Hendur grumbled. "What about you, Commander? Blood still run in your veins, or are you all dried up too?"

The idea of booting Hendur out the nearest airlock to sleep outside was growing tempting. "I'm _far_ too useless to play that game, to be frank. Team Business, I'm sorry. You're on your own."

Drawing yet another deep sigh, the Lieutenant's gaunt features twisted in muted frustration for a drawn moment of silence before succumbing to a long drag from his glass. "Okay then. Indulge me for a moment...what _do_ you two do on shore leave?"

"Go outside," Asakku quickly responded, lingering on the concept for long enough that it seemed as though there was nothing else to it. "I hear the mountains on this moon are pretty big. Wouldn't mind climbing them."

The Commander couldn't help but grin at the thought. It was a suggestion he certainly wasn't opposed to, but he was far easier to please. "I'd be happy just to feel some sunlight on my back. I swear being in space all these years and almost permanently in uniform has left me paler than ice. Last I checked I could see my veins through my skin."

Asakku took a healthy swig of his drink, raising one index finger in the Commander's direction as he continued his original thought. "What about both? Rock climbing, no shirt, boom. Multi-tasking."

"Shame you can't multi-task more often," Za'il smirked. "I'd get on board with that, though. Maybe not on _this_ planet, but definitely the next we stop by."

"You've got a deal," Asakku nodded, offering a grin that was all teeth.

"Lighten up, Lieutenant," the Commander shot with a smirk as he observed Hendur's sour scowl. "It'd do you some good. Might burn off some of those raging teenage hormones in the process."

"Teenage?" He spluttered, mouth agape as he fished for a witty response, eventually coming up dry and instead draining his glass through an indignant pout. "I'm almost thirty."

"Then you haven't learned to sweat it out," Asakku interjected, the grin remaining. "This is the military. Rule your body, or it rules you. It's a machine. Can't just let it do its own thing."

Hendur's scowl grew deeper as he shot the Commander an irritated glance. "Are you gonna just let him lecture me, Sir?"

"Loathe as I am to admit it, he's right," Suen shrugged.

"I feel like this has become a one-directional mud-slinging match," Hendur eventually frowned. "Can't I make an observation?"

"It wasn't an observation, you randy bastard," Asakku spat, expression lingering between a malicious grin and a frustrated scowl as though he couldn't quite decide which way he erred toward.

"Excuse me!" Ilabrat spluttered, apparently fighting back a shriek. "I'll have you know–"

"Now, now, children." The Captain's deep voice penetrated the Mess Hall's increasingly thick atmosphere with characteristic caramel, jarring all three Officers silent as he sauntered toward the central table. "Off the clock doesn't mean out of your minds. Tone it down."

"Yes, Sir," came the collective response before an extended, increasingly awkward silence as the Captain set about pouring himself a drink from what remained of the flagon at the centre of the table.

Casting his First Officer a somewhat vexed glance, he pulled back one of the free seats and sank down into it with a sigh. "So what spawned the nonsense this time?"

"Shore leave," Suen stated, matter-of-fact and devoid of any visible emotion. "I suspect the cabin fever is setting in."

"Ah," Shamar grunted. Pausing to indulge in a swift gulp from his glass, he stole a moment to glance about the table at each of his Officers, noting each man's vastly different demeanour through tired eyes of his own. It had been hours since he'd trailed behind the Admiral; it seemed as though the meeting had drained significant resources from the normally relaxed Captain. "Well, it's about to get worse. Word from the top is that everyone stays aboard their ships here. Something-something weapons facility, something-something classified. No tourists. Zero tolerance policy." He rolled his eyes with a sigh.

"Great," Za'il mumbled as the two Lieutenants groaned in unison. "Might I suggest scheduling something before we pick up the rest of the crew, in which case, Sir? I'd rather we didn't go bonkers before our next mission."

"I'm of the same opinion, don't worry," Shamar murmured, punctuating his thoughts with a heavy sigh before drawing a far larger gulp from his glass than was healthy and stifling the resulting cough against the back of his free hand. "Shame they had to build a facility like this on such a _pretty_ little moon. There's _quite_ a view from the Admiral's windows."

"I can only imagine," the Commander scowled. "I guess it wasn't to be. Guess we'll just push through, drop these blasted warheads and hold out hope for next time."

"That's _exactly_ what we're going to do." Draining the rest of his glass, Shamar reached for the flagon with the other hand, only to find it as empty as he'd left it. Tossing it back on the table with mock disgust, he stood to fish another from the shelf nearby. "I'll put the case to the Admiralty, lest they make alcoholics of us all."

* * *

"C'mon, Commander, just a quick glance," Hendur all but whined as he paced the expanse of Bridge before his station, pausing only to drum his fingers against the console with uninhibited frustration. "What's the harm?"

"You can't have it, so _stop whinging_ ," Asakku shot without missing a beat, his own thick, meaty fingers gripping his station with barely-restrained irritation.

"Can it, Aldamarak," the Commander scowled, his gaze never leaving the Captain's console as he continued his work. "Ilabrat, we're scheduled to leave in less than four hours. What's the point in gazing at a planet we'll never set foot on?"

"Sorry, Sir," he eventually sighed, visibly wilting by his station. "I just...it's been years, y'know? It's all starting to become pretty joyless. Like, I love the idea of protecting and serving as much as the next Officer, but lately we've just been doing a whole lot of–"

"Maybe mention it to the Captain after this mission is completed, Lieutenant," Za'il quickly interjected, stealing a moment to fire the smaller man an annoyed scowl.

"Mention what to the Captain now?" The trio stiffened to attention as Shamar entered the Bridge, arms clasped behind his back.

"Sorry, Sir," Hendur repeated, his face twisted into an unhappy grimace. "I'm just curious. Wanna know what we're missing out on. Shore leave bug won't unstick."

In contrast to his First Officer's deepening scowl, Shamar offered the Lieutenant a lopsided grin and sat down in his chair as Za'il vacated it. "You know what, I suppose it couldn't hurt. We've got a few minutes before we need to commence departure operations; let's take a quick peek behind the curtains."

For the first time in the two days that they had been docked on Syurga, a palpable wave of relief washed over Hendur's expression. Arguably it had been longer; apart from a brief, rambling diatribe before they'd arrived, Suen couldn't remember the last time he'd seen the Lieutenant at all pleased. Both junior Officers had by this point turned to eagerly watch the Captain's hands fly about his console with almost musical dexterity, with Za'il watching with tempered bemusement from his position to Shamar's right.

The Bridge was alight with colour in the next breath, the distinct domes of the facility forming in beads of light beneath abstract walls of white on either side; to the Eastern side, Za'il immediately recognised the Ninegal Range they had traversed days earlier, its distinctive shelf-like ridges and sheer cliff faces hard to miss. To the West lay the vastly more imposing Nabu range, its tallest peak easily arching into the planet's thin stratosphere. Its dominance of the landscape was absolute, and as the dots of holographic light continued to congeal, it became apparent that its mighty surfaces beyond those closest to the valley at its base were perpetually caked in snow and ice; few of its rocky outcrops lay exposed, with the majority at such an extreme angle that it would be nigh on impossible for any substance to adhere to them. The rest were a plethora of arctic valleys and soaring cliffs carved by the immense glaciers that flowed from the peak to its many surrounding compatriots. They would be mad, absolutely _mad_ , to even consider climbing the beast – the surrounding hills would have been more than enough, being mountains in their own right and reaching high enough to trigger their associated hypoxia just thinking about it.

"There you go, Lieutenant," the Captain all but purred, offering the beaming man a grin of his own. "You've got seven minutes – go have an explore."

"With pleasure, Sir," Hendur responded with a broadening grin as his hands danced across his console in an enthusiastic flurry. Hardly a moment had passed before he'd shifted the hologram's focus outward, leaving the pale blues, violets, tangerines and glowing gold of the dying, purple-stained sunset and instead focusing on the climate of a location hundreds of kilometres away. "Hey, look; the orbit of this moon is so stable there are barely any seasons. These biomes look as though they've stayed fixed for centuries."

"Could have told you that," Suen murmured through a stony look, though he eventually conceded a softer smile. "Would have been nice to see it in the flesh. It's got bizarre long-term weather patterns compared to most of what we see due to its orbit around the Gas Giant, but the Giant's orbit around the star is circular enough that those bizarre patterns are historically pretty stable."

"You're right," Hendur murmured after another moment focused on his scans. He punctuated his thoughts by shifting to another biome again, flooding the Bridge with crashing waves, the water beneath the milky-white foam of their caps a vibrant teal. The land they pounded was glacial and icy, a thick blanket of snow enshrouding all but the tallest of native flora. "Seems it's just coming out of the shadow of the Giant; it's been winter for years, though the impending summer, so to speak, should blitz the majority of this ice."

"Surprised the whole lot wasn't frozen solid when we arrived," Shamar observed quietly.

"Atmosphere wouldn't allow it, Sir," the Lieutenant explained as his fingertips raced across his console. "There's also the constant radiation and gravitational pull from the Giant. The core appears to be significantly active, no doubt due to the Giant's gravity; it generates an impressive magnetosphere that keeps all but the heat of the radiation from reaching the ground, but it also seems to have caused some spectacular volcanic fissures throughout Syurga's history. Most of the carbon dioxide and associated muck is due to constant eruptions here and there – those mountains are the only relatively old range in this hemisphere."

"Yum," the Captain remarked, wrinkling his nose. "No marks for guessing why this has remained a military facility and little more for all these years."

"A beautiful one, mind," Suen quietly added. "Disregarding the obvious deathtrap status for a moment, imagine gazing up at that range above us each morning and evening. Always fascinating looking up at a Giant looming over you – and imagine the auroras during star-facing phases."

"You'd never sleep," the Captain grinned. "If you didn't get annihilated by constant earthquakes."

"This spot is good, though," Hendur remarked as he returned the holo display to their present valley, sandwiched between the purple-stained peaks and their opposing mitre-edged cliffs. "Probably one of the most stable places on the whole moon. Disregarding those monstrous mountains, there's very little tectonic activity. Great place for a military base."

"Speaking of which," Shamar interjected, reducing the halo of colour filling the Bridge to mere static with the tap of an index finger against his console, "Syurga will be hailing us in less than a minute. Lieutenants, perform your final checks of the cargo hold. Commander, get the rest of the ship on lockdown. I'll sort out comms here on the Bridge."

"Yes, Sir,"

* * *

 _Sixty minutes and counting._

Marching the length of the Starboard-side corridor toward the Bridge with more resignation than resolve, Suen found his mind straining at the leash he so often had firmly within his grasp, begging to meander, desperate to muse the mission that lay immediately before them, and resisting the demand to remain focused on the task of departure.

Drawing a breath, he pressed his eyes closed for a moment as he withdrew from the chaos in his mind with every ounce of deliberation and control he possessed; there was plenty of time for self-indulgent _thinking_ once they were in hyperspace. Now was not the time.

Behind him came the tell-tale _clomp-clomp_ of Asakku's rushed footfalls, apparently making haste having secured the contents of the cargo hold. It took little imagination to presume the Lieutenant's state of mind – though battle-hardened and enamoured by the machinations of violence, this would be his first interdiction mission. He was without question far more eager than Za'il himself to simply _get going_.

Neither Hendur nor Shamar himself had made it to the empty Bridge yet, apparently, though they weren't far away, judging by the commentary echoing down the Port-side corridor. It was a pattern they had long since fallen into, the procedure long since burned into their collective nerves and doled out by rote; orders, by this point, were merely ritual.

Pausing by the stasis unit closest to the Captain's console, the Commander turned toward the approaching Lieutenant with a nod. "Asakku, secure units B and C."

"Sir," the staunchly-built warrior acknowledged, stepping past the Commander as he crouched by the unit.

"And give Hendur a hand with unit D once you're done," he added with a casual wave, noting the other half of the skeleton crew making their way onto the Bridge.

" _Sir,_ " he acknowledged again, irritation creeping into his tone.

"You're early, Suen," came the Captain's somewhat amused voice; behind him, Hendur indulged a half-hearted smirk as the Captain simply gestured toward the remaining stasis units.

"As usual."

As Shamar made his way toward the Captain's chair, Suen noted a series of irritated grunts from the far end of the Bridge; apparently having come unstuck with the task assigned to him, Asakku appeared to consider employing his favoured method – brute force. The balled fist hovering above the uncooperative console left little to interpretation. Releasing a sigh, he made his way over to intervene before any lasting damage could be exacted.

"Lock's jammed," Asakku grunted through clenched teeth as he crouched in front of the malfunctioning stasis unit, having sensed Za'il's presence with nary a glance.

Pausing for thought, Suen crouched alongside the burly Lieutenant. Normally he would have preferred to pull it apart and inspect right there and then, but with the departure deadline looming there was little point in indulging compulsion in the name of thoroughness; the units weren't young, and it was likely to be resolved with routine maintenance anyway. "Fixable. Let's override for now – doubt we'll need them in the immediate future. I'll make a note to get the whole lot serviced at the next starbase."

"Sounds good to me," Aldamarak enthused, setting about pinning the override. "We'll sort the rest."

"Noted." Pressing himself to his feet, Suen cast a quick glance back at the Captain; hands caught in a flurry of activity, he thought better of interrupting his Commanding Officer's flow and instead crouched to double-check the first unit he'd attended to.

"What's going on with the units?" Without either looking up or pausing in what he was doing, Za'il had little doubt Shamar was addressing him.

"Had a lock-out on Unit C. Worth requesting a service at the next starbase – we're due a drydock overhaul soon anyway."

"I'll sort it. Thank you, Commander," Shamar acknowledged as Suen made his way toward the command console. "Status?"

"Stasis units A, B and C secured. Syurga station standing by." Crouching by the Captain's post, the Commander had noted the idle conversation beginning at the rear of the Bridge. Yes, shore leave was most certainly in order after this blasted mission. "Ready for navigation, Sir?"

"On it," the Captain nodded, engaging in a renewed flurry of activity. "Behind you."

By now Za'il's eyes were entirely immune to the sudden eruption of light from one end of the Bridge to the next, gaze already locked at the outer edges of the display as Hendur's fiddling brought him to the unit to the Captain's left. Aside from the piloting itself, the navigation process was easily his favourite part of the process; the galaxy was as familiar as an old friend, with only its furthest reaches outside his grasp.

"Emesh spur to your right, Suen," Shamar quietly instructed as he drew further detail; a plethora of planets burped into view around the periphery, and dare he say it, these were unfamiliar. "50-mark-223. Yellow G-type."

"All the way over _there?_ " Scowling as he observed the galactic map reorient in a whirl the others often, perplexingly, described as _dizzying_ , he let the mathematics roar through the back of his mind. "We're looking at a two-month voyage. That's quite a distance."

"Looks like we might need to look at those units once we're in orbit after all," Shamar scowled. "I'm not putting up with you three lunatics bouncing off the bulkheads for _two months_."

Refusing to take the bait, Suen chose to instead focus on the orbiting stars overhead; to the centre hung the star in question, of that much he was certain. A yellow G-type, plain and predictable, this _had_ to be Utukka. Heavily laden with numerous planets, there were easily four candidates for the trouble planet amongst its children. "Which one, Sir?"

Shamar's hands lingered over the controls. " _Really?_ "

Za'il shot his Commanding Officer a brief – albeit indignant – glare, before squinting at the circling orbs. He had to admit, it _was_ a fair reaction; independent life often required the most habitable planets, and that almost exclusively required both abundant water and enough distance from the star to–

"Planet three."

"Very good," the Captain enthused. "Locking target."

It was a distinctive planet, the Commander realised as he observed it from the edge of the Bridge; its axial tilt was enough to induce seasons, its orbit hardly eccentric enough to be of note. Apparently the largest of the rocky planets in its system, its vast oceans appeared to dominate the southern hemisphere.

Blast his memory for these things. It would be a long time before he would scour the sight from his mind's eye. And after the warheads were dropped, there was little he would be able to do to expunge its appearance from his psyche. What colour _were_ those oceans? Were they a predictable blue, a striking teal? Were they damn-near black like those of Sirara? Did the wildlife stain them purple like those of Edimmu?

What colour were Edimmu's dead oceans now?

A harsh, unnecessarily loud chirp ripped through the Bridge's atmosphere, echoing against the bulkheads. Reaching for the nearest wall console, Za'il dragged the message up, curious as to what could _possibly_ be so important as to–

His face fell. "Captain. Priority One message from Syurga Station."

Hands once again momentarily freezing over his console, Shamar regarded his First Officer with a flash of irritated confusion before relenting; stabbing at the comms controls, he dismissed the star map, replacing it with the lone figure of Admiral Nusku, her ramrod-straight figure notably tense. Immediately it was apparent something was awry; the station's alarm klaxons echoed about the Juggernaut's halls over the comms.

"Captain Shamar. We are declaring a Code Red emergency station-wide, sub-code Omega. No one is to arrive, no one is to leave." There was, on closer inspection, a very real sense of panic that betrayed her hardened features, a oscillation in her cold voice, her quick words, that disavowed her rehearsed calm. A cold, sinking pit gripped at Za'il's stomach. "You are ordered to lock down your vessel, enter on-board stasis, and await recovery. Special Operations squadrons are enroute. Do not, under any circumstances, enter Syurga Station."

"Understood, Admiral," Shamar began after a moment's hesitation, "But–"

"You have your orders, Shamar," the Admiral barked. "Syurga out."

In a flash, the Bridge had faded to darkness. Whether or not it was his imagination, he was not sure, but Za'il could have _sworn_ he'd overheard the crashing and banging of uncontained mayhem over the comms in the distance. Weapons fire, perhaps.

Springing to his feet, Shamar set about initiating lockdown procedures. "You heard the lady, you three. Into your pods."

As Hendur crouched by his unit, keying in the access code, he turned his attention toward the Captain. "What's sub-code Omega, Sir?"

"Loss of containment," he responded hastily, plugging in the last of his instructions before marching across the Bridge toward his stasis unit.

"Containment of _what_?"

"Rabizu," Suen interjected as he pulled the canopy of his unit free, "Judging by the tone of her voice, and the chaos in the backgrou–"

"No need for that, Commander," the Captain snapped as he clambered inside. "Just get in. We'll hold a debrief once Special Ops clears the place."

Even the promise of Special Ops and the promise of isolation within the Juggernaut were little comfort as the thought, barely a seed, quickly grew roots; as the canopy locked in place, as the mask fell and the conduits interfaced with his suit, the implications of _Rabizu_ echoed louder and louder in his rapidly emptying mind, resisting the call of sleep as the cold, black tendrils of stasis dragged him under.

The very last thought in the encroaching abyss, that artificial night, resonated against its narrowing walls, all teeth and claws and mechanised horror.

* * *

 _A/N: Same shit, different bucket._

 _If you haven't read it, this story follows the events of Those Whom Fortunes Favours through different eyes. The sequel to both is **The Redemption** , and more will follow after that. You can access both via my profile/bio, or by desperately hunting through the Prometheus category and crossovers...  
_

 _...speaking of crossovers, apologies to everyone that got that strange alert. This isn't a crossover, obviously, I'm just losing my darn marbles._


	2. Emergency

Time, for all intents and purposes, only existed on the other side of the glass.

This period of stasis had been the _strangest_ he'd ever experienced – if for no reason other than his awareness of it at all. But reasons were ample.

An unending miasma of preternatural screams and distant, vague weapons fire had flooded his senses in ebbs and tides, echoing the discord they had been privy to for the Admiral's brief but frightened announcement and perching upon him, refusing to dissipate. Plasma, burning flesh, the acrid stench of sizzling metal raked at his nose, stung his eyes as gunfire roared on, the sea of agonised howls continuing ceaselessly throughout. Those noises, those smells, tenuous and shapeless, were a mere backdrop to the tightening of his throat, the pounding in his veins – panic, he knew panic when he felt it, heightened by the fact that he could not move an inch.

This wasn't his first rodeo; he _knew_ how stasis was supposed to be. In truth it was far closer to sedation than sleep, time flashing by in an imperceptible, dreamless instant until the reanimation sequence was inevitably fired – by machine or by hand, it made no difference to the mundane, routine procedure. And yet here he was, so minimally conscious that it wouldn't have registered more than a peep on the monitors, but conscious nonetheless, and able to, apparently, _dream_.

Dream, perhaps, was the wrong word for the endless, looping, eternal phantasm his nearly-but-not-quite unconscious mind had been subjected to.

Limbless, perpetually dazed, his mind was unable to quantify exactly _what_ the apparitions swirling about in terrifying shrieks were; the juxtaposition of their forms, oscillating between huge and black and sharp, and soft and translucent and small, made little sense.

Sense was a process of minds far more awake than his. Rather, the cognitive dissonance simply lingered, unabated, in consciousness' absence, swirling about his being relentlessly, eternally, until, _until_ …

There had never been a time where the reanimation sequence beginning had come with such a profound sense of _relief_.

That sequence, he knew, took little time at all; but when subjected to it, as time itself seeped through the glass and regained meaning, as frayed ends in the infinite, looping thrum of unconscious thought finally tore free, those scant moments between arousal from near-death and one's boots touching the deck outside felt like forever.

Perhaps, he reasoned – as much as he could, in his present state – those thoughts had been looping in those moments alone, and supposedly thrashing about in a dream-state for the duration of his time in stasis was a figment of his imagination, spurred on by the circumstances by which he had arrived here in the first place.

A familiar cold rush erupted along the length of his spine, akin to liquid nitrogen, from the pit of his stomach to his extremities, wrenching his dazed mind from the deep and flooding it in its icy grasp. There was never a time it had been an enjoyable sensation, lingering somewhere between plunging into a bitterly cold lake and the sort of searing panic that ripped the breath from one's lungs. Such was the function of adrenaline, he knew. It was a necessary – no, _critical_ – part of the procedure, but it didn't mean he had to like the way it awakened the mind and body alike with instantaneous, brutal effectiveness, flooding the mind with the clarity required to fly into whatever situation had presented itself on the Bridge as the jitters from the rush gradually faded.

Yes, this period in stasis had been strange, indeed.

There was nothing _clear_ about his current mental state at all. As the reanimation sequence completed, the unit's piping breaking away from his suit and releasing the godforsaken mask over his nose and mouth, there were only two things filling his dazed mind; one was the relentless, dull pounding of a cracker of a headache. The last time he'd experienced one quite like this, he had been sunburnt and dehydrated beyond belief; as far as he knew, the stasis unit was supposed to prevent exactly this. Why did he feel so fucking _dry_?

The other was just how disoriented and confused he was. Normal procedure would have left him leaping to his feet and to attention by now, awaiting orders and ready to get on with it; this time he was simply left to squint through the impossibly bright lighting, vague and lost as he blindly swung his legs free of the unit and forced himself to his feet. The Captain would surely have something sour to say about the present state of him.

Except as tried to stand, even which way _up_ was seemed to be up for debate; he'd barely managed to sit up before the dryness of his throat was now significant enough that it left him choking and gasping for breath. He was no use at all in this state. Squinting into the abyss, gulping for air, he steadied his hands against the side of the unit as he awaited orders – and a bollocking from the Captain, or whoever it was that had aroused him from stasis.

 _You're an embarrassment, Suen. Pull yourself together._

Through the haze of uncertainty enshrouding him, he was _sure_ he could, in fact, hear voices. Perhaps it was the ringing in his head, perhaps hearing damage was the predictable outcome of one too many skirmishes when he ought to have been piloting, but these voices sounded strange – thin, hollow, lingering in an unsettling range between male and female. Willing his vision to settle, he glanced about the Bridge expecting to see his crew, Special Ops, _someone_.

 _Someone_ was, indeed, there. How had he missed that? His own uselessness was beginning to grate on his nerves.

"We arrive for this man, does not wish to die," another thin, pale voice announced right beside him; the jolt that echoed about his system went a long way to clearing the fog in his head, but there's little doubt it was not due to the proximity of the strange creature. No, it was the fact that it had spoken not in Sebiti as he'd rightly expected, but an old, alien tongue he hadn't heard in _years_ , yet nonetheless understood. Heck, in this moment, he couldn't even remember the language's name.

"Eternal life, we wish you give," the voice continued. Near-nonsensical message aside, the creature's impenetrable accent left him scrambling to make sense out of whatever the merry _Hell_ he'd just been told.

By now the infernal lighting on the Bridge had faded – or, at least, his vision had finally adjusted – and the figures standing around him had crystallised into something entirely unfamiliar. The five people standing before him were not Sebiti. In fact, they were like nothing he'd ever seen before. Their colourful faces would seem featureless and dull were it not for matts of fur placed atop their skulls, and though he didn't recognise this species _at all_ , there was a lingering, nagging, _profound_ sensation that he ought to.

But he was not a scientist or a diplomat, he was a military man; the fact that one of them appeared to be armed was not lost on him. These were not the people that were meant to be here.

Enough tooling about. For the sake of the crew – wherever the Hell they were right now – it was time to take control of the situation.

He forced himself to his feet, straightening out before the creatures before him as he ignored the pounding, swirling maelstrom within his skull, squaring his shoulders as he hurriedly set about plucking details about each of his uninvited guests. Immediately apparent was their stature; he'd assumed, wrongly apparently, that they were significantly larger than they were, but alas, they were merely the size of children. Their diminutive size explained their strangely-pitched voices; there wouldn't be nearly adequate enough lung capacity in their tiny torsos for a proper voice. The three closest to him, upon reflection, were likely male – the two smaller intruders appeared to at least be _shaped_ like the females he knew and understood, though he'd been wrong about these things before.

Staring down at them, he soon noticed their apparent lack of armour and thin, clear helmets. There was no bulk to their gear nor, evidently, their respective physiques. Apart from the male standing astride the wisened central figure bearing arms, there was little to suggest a credible threat. Their gear seemed downright primitive. But he had been wrong about these things before, too.

The next course of action seemed obvious. Drawing a breath, he stepped down from the stasis unit and prepared to ascertain their motives.

Or, at least, he intended to. As the universe flipped on its head, it was all he could manage not to crash to the deck in a dishevelled mess. In the next breath he found himself sitting back down with a dull _thunk_ , fingers groping for the ground as his head once again rejected gravity. Swiftly running out of patience as a familiar, tiny, white-hot pebble of rage began to knit itself into the core of his abdomen, he resolved to see to the blasted stasis unit with Aldamarak's preferred methods himself for its failure to deliver him intact and be damned the consequences.

The earliest machinations of chaos had unfolded before him as he'd rocked to his feet. The closest of the five intruders, stinking of old age and degeneration, had apparently capitulated, and two of the others had rushed to his aid in a flurry of activity. The creature was frail, painfully frail. There was little doubt in his mind that such a creature was nearing death. The yellow-haired creature's garbled message made a little more sense when applied to the veritable walking dead before him, which served only to stoke his indignation: what in the name of _Gugalanna_ were these idiots doing with a walking corpse aboard a military vessel, at a classified military base?

It was time to put an end to these antics. Seeking to make his point indisputably clear, he raised his voice over the clamour of alien feet and pitched it, quite deliberately, as far out of the range of such small creatures could hope to replicate as he could. Though he was far from the largest, most intimidating Sebiti officer in existence, the military's reputation preceded it amongst all that mattered, and this child-race ought to be reminded of that.

"Who are you, and what are you doing aboard this vessel?" he announced in the biggest voice he could muster – and what he could muster was hardly impressive. How badly had that stupid, decrepit stasis unit malfunctioned? Rather than the booming, authoritative growl he'd intended, he was left with a strained rasp. His lungs, throat, mouth alike were arid to the point of nearly choking again. What other nasty surprises awaited him as the situation unfolded? Tugging at his core, welling in his throat, the rising heat of rage brought with it a palpable, nagging tension. A potential fuse for the powder-keg building within, he distantly knew, but that knowledge was useless in the now.

The creatures had reeled backward as he pushed himself to his knees, the wisened corpse immediately exchanging paper-thin words with the taller, yellow-headed male while their companions merely watched on in terrified silence. Something twisted in his gut as he observed the pair; something was _wrong, wrong, wrong_ here and as he failed to place it, the tension swelled further.

 _Think, Za'il, think!_

They were not of a species he knew, but he could not shake the sensation that he ought to. They had arrived with one large weapon and nothing more – no bags, no equipment. Their suits were flimsy and archaic, poorly suited to what he knew lay beyond. Only one appeared to speak a familiar language, and poorly at that; they stood before him, scattered, disorganised and terrified. Or, troublingly, three of them appeared soaked to the bone in paralysed fear. The walking corpse had not an ounce of fear about him. No; written all over _that_ face was hunger, entitlement, victory. It struck him as immensely punchable.

There was not a chance they were military. _Good._ It left him with the upper hand, despite being significantly outnumbered. They didn't appear to be scientists or diplomats, either – they were far too chaotic and undisciplined, and seemed uninterested in _truly_ engaging with him. Perhaps they were civilians...with weapons. Not unheard of, but perhaps not the first logical assumption. There was no call, in his mind, for any kind of civilian from anywhere, to be aboard a Sebiti Juggernaut – least of all one ordered into lockdown.

The obvious struck him. His jaw clenched.

Clearly, these were pirates. Amateur, woefully-underprepared pirates. The one stinking of old age was beyond a doubt their leader, the yellow one his second-in-command presumably, and the motives of the armed male were obvious, but the females, particularly the one hanging rearward, remained a mystery. There was an air of sweat and blood about her, from what he could make of her distance from him. If she was injured, oughtn't they be asking him to come to _her_ aid? The yellow one had distinctly mentioned a _man_ in their brief exchange.

That smaller female, apparently, was not as injured as he initially presumed. The pirates' collective attention was immediately upon her as she spoke in their strange, alien tongue; she persisted even as the elderly one sought to silence her and, unsettlingly, her dark eyes had shot straight past all of her people and found his own. There was an intensity in her stare that left him seized on one knee.

That is, until the armed male inexplicably swung the barrel of his weapon into the female's abdomen. Jaw agape, he watched in stunned silence as the blow left her bonelessly crumpling to the deck, screaming in agony. His first observation had, in fact, been correct after all – she was without a doubt injured. Injured, desperate, and her own kind had simply slugged her in the gut to silence her. Their violence certainly matched the description of pirates.

With the male's weapon trained on the fallen female's skull, the decrepit creature continued his diatribe, beady eyes boring holes into him, but even the stench of the intruder's breath could distract him from the female as, soundless but defiantly biting her lower lip, she forced herself back to her feet. It made absolutely no sense. Was she a prisoner? Were these creatures one of the archaic kind that did not allow their women to speak? Everything in his training insisted he ought to be providing medical care, except all that went out the nearest airlock with the presence of a weapon.

No civilised species was like this. Hell, anything Anuka that showed even _hints_ of this sort of savagery were usually seen to with a swift interdiction, or–

 _All the technology required to cause trouble, but all they want is magical abilities. Invincibility. Eternal life. Superpowers. And with their millennia of wars behind them, they'll take what they please._

At any other time the realisation would have him seriously questioning his sanity, but in this moment, right now, it punched him in the gut with such ferocity that it left no doubt in his mind. These were _Utukka_ people. Nothing else in the galaxy still left alive was like this. Utukka people with technology, snatching what they pleased, just like Shamar had said a mere day ago.

The fuse was lit.

The yellow-haired male had begun babbling foreign nonsense at him again, but what little of the drivel he could make of it merely confirmed his assumptions. They were demanding immortality like the savages they were, and the yellow-headed creature was not one of them. His movements were too smooth, too deliberate, too mathematical. He smelled of nothing, he did not flinch as his compatriots did when Za'il pushed himself back to his feet. He was not natural, not natural–

 _Adrammu._

Never in his life had he witnessed an Adrammu, nor had he ever expected to; the abominations had been completely and utterly outlawed for so many centuries that he couldn't quite bring himself to curse his inattention to the obvious when he hadn't a clue what to look for in the first place.

These wretched people had dragged a fucking _Adrammu_ aboard, hadn't they?

Surely not.

Placing a hand gingerly atop the yellow mop before him, he wasn't sure what to expect; if he had misread the situation and this was indeed a living, breathing creature, he'd be content to drag the lot of them out the nearest airlock and find out what in the name of _Gugalanna_ there had been a security breach during a Code Red emergency, and why the fuck Special Ops were conspicuously absent when they were supposedly enroute. Heck, if they showed themselves out nicely, he would even weigh up a non-committal apology for wasting their time and see to it they _actually_ set course to whence they came before he left orbit.

The flesh below the yellow fur was not flesh at all; cold, hard, it lacked everything about flesh that made sense. There was no oil or humidity about its surface, and it did not yield to his fingertips as it ought to have – hair or not. Those fine yellow strands were too uniform, too perfect to be real. Again, the synthetic creature did not flinch, even when being touched; in fact, it simply responded with a smug grin.

The fuse had burned. The fire erupted.

It had been a significantly long time since the Sebiti Rage, notorious for a million and one reasons from one end of the quadrant to the other, had gripped him. Perhaps it was a product of age and wisdom, the tempering of a young Officer into a hardened Commander; there had been little reason to trigger it in recent years. It had been building and building over these past few months, though – that much was undeniable. One thing had added to another and, having been presented with the most absurd of crises in this moment, his senses had finally surrendered to its white-hot vacuum, flooding every fibre in his being with molten metal as the colour faded from his vision.

A singular thought, clear as a bell, gripped his psyche. _Neutralise the threat._

The strength the Rage afforded him could never be understated. Child-like shouts echoed through distant haze as he seized the Adrammu's head with both hands, dragging it from its feet and twisting until a satisfying _pop_ released its body from its skull.

 _One down._

As little of a threat as the old bastard presented physically, it was the ideology he peddled that made his stomach churn; the creature was at least a metre shorter than him, crippled, held together with a downright _comical_ frame, and yet he still had the audacity to swipe protectively at the raging soldier. Thinking little more of it, he swung the only thing he had on hand – the Adrammu's head – at his target's skull, then discarded it as the decrepit fool folded to the deck.

 _Two down._

In the next breath a deafening _crack_ had ripped through the atmosphere, instantly followed by a sharp, searing blow to his chest. Of course, the armed one; a moment of clarity bubbling through the Rage thanked the creature's poor aim, because though it certainly hurt like _Hell_ , it was unlikely he'd be able to immediately charge the brute had he fired at his head rather than his chest. The Rage pushed through the pain effortlessly, and even before he'd mown the wretched creature down, his suit had set about doing its damn job and knitting across the exposed, wounded flesh. At least _something_ was performing in this godforsaken place.

The tiny male proved simple to disarm; having chosen to delay reloading his weapon, he provided absolutely no resistance. In fact, he had the good grace to simply drop his rifle as Za'il picked him up and thrust him across the room, then immediately lose consciousness as he struck the far wall.

 _Three down._

A momentary flash of colour returned to his vision as he bore down on one of the remaining intruders – one of the females, paralysed and trembling with fear – and, in a brief second of hesitation, he wondered just how much damage an unarmed, terrified, tiny female could do. Hitting the wall seemed to do the trick with her compatriot; he would deal with them when he had time to think. For now he needed them unconscious and out of his way. She, too, offered no resistance and obediently sailed through the air, and he turned to the final intruder as the larger female slumped silently against the far wall.

 _Four down, one to go._

It appeared the injured one was the only member of the invasion party possessing common sense. Having witnessed her blasted Adrammu beheaded and her compatriots effortlessly beaten unconscious, she'd snatched her helmet from the floor and fled as fast as her tiny legs could take her. Good. One less idiot to wrangle off his Bridge when they finally came around. Too bad for them; their chance to exit the airlock while they were still on the ground had come to a close. The tiny, wounded female would sort herself out, if she could figure out how to get off the vessel at all...she was no threat to him, even if she was still stuck inside once they were in orbit.

Turning on a heel, the Commander drew a deep breath and held it before slowly, forcefully exhaling, willing the colour back into his vision as his heart pounded in his ears. As brilliant as the Rage was in the heat of battle, it was of utterly no use when trying to pilot; at least, as it began to relinquish his grasp on him, it had finally cleared the fog from his mind and brought his full consciousness to the fore.

With that clarity came time, and the time they'd spent immediately before the Code Red announcement; there had been a mission at hand, and he had a sneaking suspicion things had continued to get further out of hand after they'd retreated to their stasis units. Reaching over the Captain's exceptionally dusty console, he mused that thought as he initiated the central navigation array.

The Rage's effect on his vision continued to pulse back and forth as he stepped over the unconscious intruders bleeding all over his Bridge, briefly remaining the desaturated indigo of its heat as he ascended the ladder, and finally settling on something akin to sanity as he unfurled into the seat. The helmet descending over his head brought with it confort in its familiarity, and the Rage quickly retreated to a mere dot.

The ship's short-range sensors took an unusually long moment to come online, seemingly struggling briefly before _plink_ ing to life; propulsion, thankfully, was far more obedient and hummed into action without complaint.

Just what _was_ the state of affairs out there? Surely the chaos couldn't have been too extreme, given their uninvited guests; there was no way it could be _Rabizu_ if those tiny Utukka people had staggered in here with no armour and only one weapon between them. Following protocol, he set comms to ping the station for a status update while he fired up long-range sensors, impatiently awaiting feedback from either system.

Silence from the short range sensors. No interstellar activity within half a parsec, no movement in Hyperdrive, just the idle of nearby machinery. Strange.

Silence from comms, apart from the same, repeating Code Red that had been announced earlier. Strange, indeed.

Another brief but significant twitch of heat pulsed through his gut as the Rage refused to be entirely quelled; drawing and holding another slow, deep breath, he sought to drown it once more. It's usefulness had since expired, and while the plain, vanilla sensation of normal rage rarely got in the way, the real deal made it almost impossible to focus on anything other than wanton destruction. Right now, he instead needed answers.

Long range sensors were about as useful as everything else presently was; no interstellar activity, and nothing coming through comms on the secretive, classified frequencies that Special Ops most often used. Heck, there was nothing at all. Perhaps the station had initiated a blanket lock-out?

If that was the case, he knew he'd never get orders from the station until Special Ops had cleared the place. It finally registered, far later than it should have, that he was on a mission to eliminate the Utukka species for the exact reasons that they'd displayed to him...and yet, here they were, raiding the place.

Another pulse of rage unsettled his insides. There was nothing for it – he ought to get the ship into orbit, awaken the rest of the crew, and get the job over with so they could investigate that the Hell had happened on this wretched base.

And if his own reanimation had set the tone, the crew were going to need either medical attention, puke buckets, or a combination of both.

Triggering the hangar doors from his console, he set about powering up atmospheric thrusters as he pinged the station one last time with his intentions. When no response was forthcoming, he steadied himself against his chair and proceeded with his plan; with rehearsed calm he eased the ship out of the dusty, groaning door above and set about exiting station airspace.

Just why was there so much _crap_ falling from the hangar door? Had the storm really belched _that_ much debris across the valley? Surely not.

As the Juggernaut ascended, he found he was more pleased than he ought to have been in leaving this wretched moon behind.

An alarm pierced the rumble of the engines and the clatter of bulkheads; orange and angry, the bottom right of his display was repetitively flashing a familiar warning: _incoming._

That _machinery_ he'd detected earlier was, so it appeared, a vessel. Smaller than the Juggernaut and _vastly_ more frail, it was so primitive that its propulsion system hadn't even registered as such on sensors! And yet here it was, lumbering awkwardly after him in a feat that defied logic.

Fingers flew over the console as he ran a quick scan over the vessel. Its construction was weaker than he'd thought – just how _was_ it airborne? – and it was unarmed. Nothing registered as weapons at all, despite its complete lack of shielding allowing the scan to penetrate every inch of it. There were no shields, no armour, no significant reinforcement. It was little more than a civilian ship.

It posed no threat. If it followed him into hyperdrive, he would rip it to atoms.

As he focused on setting course for that distant G-type star, the blinking orange alert had rapidly brightened to red. The klaxon was almost deafening and, as the cold of panic descended his limbs, his fingers darted about the helm. The _thing_ tailing him had inexplicably fired its interstellar propulsion, closing the gap between them with indescribable pace. No amount of evasive manoeuvres would counter it in time, and the ship was incapable of adequately accelerating away with so little warning, but _damnit_ he would _try_.

It was all he could do to merely grit his teeth as the universe around him became nothing but noise, violence, and light.

The force of the impact had thrown him back into his chair, knocking the wind from his lungs as artificial gravity failed to counter the new, cataclysmic increase in momentum. The console above him had similarly failed but in far more violent form, its subsequent explosion briefly putting an end to the onslaught of sheer noise. As its heat ripped through his helmet and fractured the armour surrounding him, he heard nothing but static, and, as the helmet yielded to the flames, the world faded to black.

* * *

The first thing he was aware of when he came to was persistent, all-encompassing ringing in his ears. As though needles being driven into his skull, the static was downright _painful_.

Clencing his fists and squeezing his eyes closed, the next thing he became aware of was that his face was pressed against the cold of the deck; as he strained against the knobbled surface, forcing himself to his knees, his head protested with spinning, throbbing agony. With a strangled grunt he collapsed back against the deck, forehead meeting metal with a _thunk_.

The third thing he was aware of was just how much his face _hurt_. Last he remembered, the navigation array had deployed its helmet and armour. His face shouldn't be aching like this, it should have remained safely enclosed in the helmet.

Squinting through the smoky haze, he quickly spotted it. Or, rather, the _remains_ of it, shattered in several significant pieces over the deck below the navigation array. Beside it lay the majority of his armour, separated into multiple components and scattered between the array and his present position, splattered pathetically across the floor. How the Hell had this come to be?

A pained groan escaped him as he rolled onto his back, blinking away dust and ash as he stared at the navigation array above; the console itself had been reduced to a mass of ripped wires and torn conduits, sparking angrily from what remained of it. A quick survey of the Bridge as he sat up revealed the rest had not fared much better, broken bulkheads and smashed consoles fizzling angrily in the wake of whatever the _fuck_ had just befallen the ship.

Last he recalled, there had been a pursuit alarm; the pirate ship had tailed him on ascent, struggling to match pace with the far more technologically advanced–

 _No_ , he corrected himself, staggering toward the Captain's console, _last thing you saw was an_ impact _alarm, idiot._

What remained of the sensors reported the ship had come to rest on the ground. Wincing as he sunk into the Captain's chair, his fingers flew about the console in search of more data. Were there more ships? Was there another raft of intruders waiting to breech their defenses now that there were none, now that they were sitting ducks? Was this the plan all along? Surely not.

He'd clearly been wrong about the nature of that primitive ship, hadn't he?

Nothing matching the schematics of the pirate vessel was anywhere to be found. There was nothing but heat spots peppered across the landscape and unburnt fuel staining the atmosphere. He was beginning to distrust these sensors; so far, the constant negatives had done nothing to help, had they? He was so, _so_ tired of nasty surprises. Forcing another, deeper scan, he awaited something, _anything_ of use.

Not that anything was going to be useful in the wake of a crippled ship, was it?

A faint _blip_ pierced the air. The deep scan had pinged a tiny energy source on the surface. Leaving nothing to chance, he hastily zeroed in on the source and magnified it as much as the crippled, flickering sensors would allow.

The energy source was, it seemed, a small craft of a similarly prehistoric design to the pirate vessel that had disabled the Juggernaut. They must have jettisoned it during the collision – there was no way such a small craft could have sustained all five of the intruders. It was little more than a shuttle.

A flicker of movement just beyond the craft caught his eye. Normally he would simply dismiss such an insignificant anomaly, but the day had already set the tone; pushing the sensors to their limits, he focused on the slow, plodding ripple.

After a moment the circling, wobbling haze quickly coalesced into a roughly bipedal figure; a moment longer, and it found a disturbingly familiar form. Drawing a breath, he squinted long and hard as subsequent scans formed a clearer and clearer image. There was no doubt about it – this was the lone female he had allowed to escape, running across the Syurga landscape toward the tiny vessel.

Gnawing at the pit of his stomach, righteous anger was quickly replaced by a resurgeance of Rage. _She_ had done this!

Just how many things he'd been wrong about of late were a cause for embarrassment that he'd likely be marinating in for a significant period of time after all this was over. Heck, at this rate, he wouldn't be surprised if he saw a demotion for his lack of foresight and...and…

Arrogance, wasn't it?

There had been significant oversights, but perhaps the most critical of which was the assumption that an injured, child-sized woman from an undeveloped cave-man race posed no threat. She had instigated all this, that was without doubt...and as long as she was still standing, who knew what _else_ she was capable of.

The figure painted in orbs of light had briefly paused by the stern of the vessel, doubled over in what appeared to be agony, before desperately scrambling up onto the platform and rattling at the door. The Rage, knotting at his insides, clawing at his chest, burst free once more and enveloped his being, searing through his veins. In that moment, nothing hurt. Not his head, not his face, not the shoulder he'd seemingly landed on, not the slowly healing gunshot wound in his chest. There was only one thought: _neutralise the threat._

"Bitch. You'll get yours."

* * *

 _A/N: HOLY CRAP, HE LIVES._

Good Lord, this was not the sort of hiatus I intended. Long story short, I am shit at managing my life like a grown adult and the wild oscillations between way too much work and 'how do I pay the rent next week' drove me into a fair amount of burnout. People like me should probably not freelance.

Of all things, what brought juice back to the creativity was yet another movie with yet another monster...I've become low-key obsessed with The Shape of Water, and instead of funnelling my creative fuckery into yet another fandom as I usually do, I'm trying to channel it into this guy. Lucky for you all!

This chapter is a little rough around the edges, possibly a little too rough for my liking, but I'm THAT rusty after months of simply keeping my head above water. It'll likely get a revisit, just like TWFF will soon enough.

Speaking of which...looks like we're cliffing right where TWFF picks up. How about that.

 _(PS: FF readers, I am so, so sorry I can't actually respond to your kind messages. I can on AO3 or DA or WattPad! But I love you all regardless, no matter where you read.)_


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